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The Orion Nebula as seen by Planck at microwave wavelengths. The red colour shows longer wavelength light which is emitted by electrons spiralling round magnetic fields in the Galaxy, while the green and blue material is emitted by dust laced between the stars. The gas and dust are what stars are made of, and measuring their distribution is crucial to working out how stars form, and what effect the properties of the gas and dust can have on the resulting stars. The loop of red material is Barnard's Loop, which is a ring of material around 300 light years across and about 1600 lightyears away. The ring was formed by a supernova which exploded millions of years ago.

The same region of sky at visible wavelengths. Hover the mouse over to see the Planck image overlaid. Image credit: DSS (visible); ESA / HFI / LFI (microwave)

The same patch of sky is shown on the right at visible wavelengths, with the Planck image overlaid if you hover your mouse over it. The three stars on the right of the visible light image are the "belt" of Orion, while the bright feature just below the centre is the Orion Nebula, associated with the stars in the "sword" of Orion.

Because Planck is mapping the entire sky, it can observe the gas and dust over the whole sky. Other experiments, such as Herschel, can examine the dust at much higher resolution, but only over small regions.

You can also see a similar image of a region of sky in the constellation of Perseus here.

You can also see this part of the sky at different wavelengths on Chromoscope.